POSITION: Professor of History
DEPARTMENT: History & Political Science
LOCATION: Main Campus, Harrisonburg | RLN 314
PHONE: (540) 432-4408
Mary Susan Sprunger has taught at EMU since 1992. She earned a B.A. in History and German at Bethel College (Kansas) and an M.A. and Ph.D. in History from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana. Her teaching interests include European, world, women’s and Mennonite history. Her newest course topics include food history and comparative colonialisms. She is writing a book on the economic and cultural dimensions of a wealthy, urban Mennonite church during the Dutch Golden Age (the seventeenth century). She is married and is the mother of two adult children.
BA, Bethel College (History & German)
PHD, University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana (History Renassance Reformation with a Minor in Medieval Europe & Medievel Art History)
MA, University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana (History)
Introduction to Hans de Ries: A Study in Second Generation Dutch Anabaptism by Cornelius J. Dyck, i-xiv. Edited by Maxwell Kennel. N.p.: Pandora Press, 2023.
"In der Stadt und von der Stadt: Die Täufer in der Wirtschaftsgeschichte des Goldenen Zeitalters der Niederlande. Ein Gegenentwurf zum agrarisch geprägten Mennonitentum" [In the City and of the City: Doopsgezinden and the Dutch Golden Age Economy as Antithesis to the Mennonite Agrarian Ideal], trans. Ulrike Arnold, Mennonitische Geschichtsblätter 79 (2022): 43-68.
"From Communalism to Capitalism: Mennonites and Money in the Early Dutch Republic," Revue de l'historie des religions (2020): 675-703.
Co-author with Keith L. Sprunger, “Big Brother is Watching: FBI Surveillance of Antiwar Activities at Mennonite Colleges in the 1960s,” Mennonite Quarterly Review 92 (2018), 5-31.
Co-editor with Mark Jantzen and John D. Thiesen. European Mennonites and the Challenge of Modernity over Five Centuries: Contributors, Detractors, and Adapters. North Newton, KS: Bethel College, 2016.
“A Mennonite Capitalist Ethic in the Dutch Golden Age; Weber Revisited.” In European Mennonites and the Challenge of Modernity over Five Centuries: Contributors, Detractors, and Adapters, edited by Mark Jantzen, Mary S. Sprunger and John D. Thiesen, 51-70 (see above).
"From Turmoil to Peace: How Menno Simons and Pilgram Marpeck Guided Anabaptists Through Troubled Times," Christian History Issue 120 (2016).
“Being Mennonite: Neighborhood, Family, and Confessional Choice in Golden Age Amsterdam.” In Religious Minorities and Cultural Diversity in the Dutch Republic: Studies Presented to Piet Visser on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday, edited by August den Hollander, Alex Noord, Mirjam van Veen and Anna Voolstra, 150-70. Brill’s Series in Church History 67. Leiden: Brill, 2014.
“Deaconesses, Fishwives, Crooks and Prophetesses: Mennonite Image and Reality in Golden Age Amsterdam.” In Sisters: Myth and Reality of Anabaptist, Mennonite, and Doopsgezind Women, ca 1525-1900, edited by Mirjam van Veen, Piet Visser and Gary K. Waite, 169-85. Brill’s Series in Church History 65. Leiden: Brill, 2014.
“ Apologia for an Informed Mennonite Citizenry: A Personal Journey.” Conrad Grebel Review 30 (2012): 286-98.
“Limits of Faith in a Maritime Empire: Mennonites, Trade and Politics in the Dutch Golden Age” in The Limits of Empire: European Imperial Formations in Early Modern World History, edited by Antonio Andrade and William Reger, pp. 59-77. Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing, 2012. (festschrift for Geoffrey Parker).
Book Review of Huebert Hecht, Linda A. Women in Early Austrian Anabaptism: Their Days, Their Stories in Mennonite Quarterly Review 85 (2011): 325-27.
“Keeney, William E.” Article for new German Mennonite Encyclopedia (_Mennonitische Lexikon), vol. 5: Part I: People (in press). See online at: http://www.mennlex.de/doku.php?id=art:keeney_william_e
Co-author with Keith L. Sprunger. “The Church in the Bakehouse: John Smyth’s English Anabaptist Congregation at Amsterdam, 1609-1660.” Mennonite Quarterly Review 85 (2011): 219-258.
“Limits of Faith in a Maritime Empire: Mennonites, Trade and Politics in the Dutch Golden Age.” Will appear as chapter in Geoffrey Parker festschrift.
“Why the Rich Got Mennonite: Church Membership, Status and Wealth in Golden Age Amsterdam.” Journal of Mennonite Studies 27 (2009): 41-59.
“Iemand burgemeester maken. Doopsgezinden en regenten geslachten in de Gouden Eeuw te Amsterdam.” Doopsgezind Bijdragen 32 (2006): 75-121. (“In Bed With the Burgomaster: Mennonites and Regent Family Ties in Golden Age Amsterdam”).
“Mennonites and Sectarian Poor Relief in Golden-Age Amsterdam.” In The Reformation of Charity: The Secular and the Religious in Early Modern Poor Relief, pp. 137-53. Edited by Thomas Max Safley. Boston and Leiden: Brill, 2003.
“Mutual Aid Among Dutch Waterlander Mennonites, 1605-1668.” In _Building Communities of
Compassion_, 144-67. Edited by Willard Swartley and Donald B. Graybill. Scottdale. PA: Herald Press, 1998.
Co-author with Piet Visser. Menno Simons: Places, Portraits and Progeny. Masthof Press, 1996.
“Entrepreneurs and Ethics: Mennonite Merchants in Seventeenth-Century Amsterdam.” In Entrepreneurs and Entrepreneurship in Early Modern Times: Merchants and Industrialists within the Orbit of the Dutch Staple Market, 213-21. Edited by C. Lesger and L. Noordegraaf. Hollandse Historische Reeks 24, 1996.
Selected as one of 30 scholars nationally to attend the seminar “Homer Across the Curriculum: The Iliad” at the Center for Hellenic Studies, Washington D.C. (July 10-14, 2006).
American Historical Association
Mennonite Historical Society
Doopsgezinde Historische Kring
Faculty Scholarship Committee
Committee on Teacher Education